A couple weeks ago, I ran out of my asthma inhaler. An unfortunate set of circumstances meant that it would be a week before I could see my doctor to renew my prescription. Normally, if I run out, my pharmacist can give me one refill while I organize to see my doctor, but she was on vacation. And for me to go a week without my inhaler, which I take daily, would—and did—trigger an asthma attack. Pair that with a 48-hour period where I didn’t sleep more than three hours, and all my favourite friends came out to play: self-doubt, procrastination, and defeatism. I knew my biggest challenge would be getting unstuck.
When Mindset Falters
I’ve always known the importance of mindset as I pursue my writing and other goals. I must believe that I can achieve what I set out to do. And if I believe, then I know I will show up and do the work…on most days. Because I’m human, and sometimes I falter. But as I dealt with my asthma (and the difficulty I had breathing for several days) and the fatigue, the momentum I had built up over the preceding weeks had almost instantly waned. It was a struggle to focus, to write, to not let distractions rule the day. And I felt like giving up, asking myself repeatedly, “What’s the point?”
Getting unstuck wasn’t easy. Whenever a wave of fatigue hit, I told myself I’d push through it and brew a coffee. But the caffeine didn’t help, and I’d crawl into bed. I wouldn’t sleep. I’d just lay there imagining me doing the work but unable, or rather unwilling, to move. When the coughing woke me up at two in the morning, I’d get up and write for a bit but still tired, I soon found myself surfing the net or playing the word game on the Tim Hortons app. I was far from being who I’d challenged myself to become. Even though I knew better, even though I’d done better in the past, Ryan Holiday’s advice bounced right off me, that “Once something is done, you can build on it. When you show up, you can get lucky.”1
Getting Unstuck
I can blame my asthma and the lack of sleep, but at the end of the day I’m responsible for not showing up like I should. I let the distractions disrupt me, and then, consequently, fuel the doubt and defeatism. SoI had to find a way to pick myself up again, to find the magic formula to getting unstuck.
And the ‘magic’ in that formula is this: get to work. Stop with the excuses. Cut out everything from your life that is not serving your life or purpose. It’s hard because that means leaving our comfort zone. But Mandy Hale reminds that “Growth is painful. Change is painful. But nothing is as painful as staying stuck somewhere you don’t belong.”
So, just for today I will try, one more time, to go to that place where I belong.
Let me, then, leave you today with this last thought…
You are loved, you are worthy, and you matter. And, best of all, you do not need anyone’s permission to be—unapologetically—who you are.
- Holiday, R. (2022). Discipline is Destiny: The Power of Self-Control, New York, Portfolio/Penguin, p. 44. [↩]
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